Ruck bails on C2M at ASE11

On my way back to my humble abode here in paradise I bumped into a friend of mine at the airport and he told me that Ruck had just stepped down as CEO of C2M to pursue his coaching/mentoring project full time. It came as a shock to the guys but I guess all good things must come to an end eventually. So now, Steve Howe has taken over the position of CEO and will continue to drive C2M forward as one of the most solid networks in the space! Congratulations to Steve and I wish you and the whole C2M crew the best of luck moving forward!

Well according to Rucks own posts on both WF and C2M blog (the posts were removed but a whole thread on WF dedicated to it) he feels that he's been forced out by Steve due to differing opinions on managing the business.

They had private meetings at ASE where Ruck felt he was being forcefully ousted or kicked out.

It's been posted everywhere so it's not entirely disputable.

Ruck and his boy are starting a paid-coaching forum to help marketers.

"In a turning change of events, Iâ€™m disappointed to say that the actions of my partners Steve Howe and Michael Durham have now caused a turn of events that will not allow Ryan Gray an affiliate manager of Convert2Media and myself Ralph Ruckman, the current Chief Executive Officer of the Convert2Media Affiliate Network to no longer be able to participate in the daily operations of the Convert2Media Affiliate Network.

Itâ€™s unfortunate that yesterday during the last day of the Affiliate Summit East tradeshow a private meeting was held between the current COO Steve Howe, the current CFO Michael Durham and the current CEO Ralph Ruckman whereas I stated and held a discussion to potentially plan an exit from the Convert2Media Affiliate Network. As with a lot of Networks in this Industry over the last year, I felt that the company was not only being mismanaged from a Corporate point of view but the network had become something I no longer wished to have daily involvement with.

In true immature fashion, I waited throughout the night for a â€œlockoutâ€ which is typically Steve Howeâ€™s idea of ending business on a level of maturity that can only be compared to that of an infant and that is exactly what has happened. Where we go from here, well, unfortunately with a deliberate piercing of the corporate veil, I believe that the advertisers, affiliates and staff of C2M will face intense scrutiny publically on the actions of just a couple.

I personally have worked long and hard alongside my partners and staff of C2M to build one of the most solid Affiliate Networks in the Industry and after trying to bring the situation privately to my partners at first to avoid any miscommunication and drama, it has now come to this without warning.

I promise to do everything in my power to restore the reputation of the C2M network, however apparently until legal counsel is notified and now gets involved, I would like everyone to know that this is the current situation.

What a mess boy do you guys/girls really love the drama over here on wickedfire. Regardless, as you have seen or heard by now about the early morning blog post to which I along with the rest of the company woke up to this morning there have been some changes to the partnership behind the Convert2Media Affiliate Network. I am replying to this from the airport on my iPhone befor it spins any further out of control.

While I can not go into the very details as we have not made any official changes legally to the operating agreements or signed papers between partners.

One thing that is certain is that Ruck told Michael Durham and myself that he was stepping down as CEO of Convert2Media to pursue other business ventures. As some of you are aware Ruck and Ryan have formed a paid forum and coaching / seminar style business to which they both wish to focus their full-time and attention towards. Michael and I were both happy for Ruck and his new venture.

In effort to protect the integrity of the business some permissions were removed along with sone other security measures as any business owner would see proper in such a situation. As a result a blog post was fired off to which was very unprofessional and after a long meeting this morning was removed along with the thread in this forum by Ruck who is a MOD.

While convert2media is a healthy, growing business with stronger than ever financials in the affiliate marketing industry we wish to keep our business private vs aired out as dirty laundry on the forums.

If you are an affiliate who was previously assigned to Ruck or Ryan Gray you will be having your account reassigned to another manager. Please contact myself or another member of our team to request a specific manager.

In other news we are hiring experienced affiliate manager to work from our Orlando, Florida office feel free to contact me directly if you are interested.

In the meantime for these of you who made it to affiliate summit thanks for stopping by and we look forward to continuing to grow and strengthen our relationship with you and your companies!